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The River Spean flows from Loch Laggan in a westerly direction to join the River Lochy at
Gairlochy Gairlochy ''(Scottish Gaelic: Geàrr Lòchaidh)'' is a clachan, or hamlet, of population approx. 100. It lies on the southern shores of Loch Lochy, a large freshwater loch in the district of Lochaber in the North West Highlands of Scotland. G ...
in the
Great Glen The Great Glen ( gd, An Gleann Mòr ), also known as Glen Albyn (from the Gaelic "Glen of Scotland" ) or Glen More (from the Gaelic ), is a glen in Scotland running for from Inverness on the edge of Moray Firth, in an approximately straight ...
in the
West Highlands The Highlands ( sco, the Hielands; gd, a’ Ghàidhealtachd , 'the place of the Gaels') is a historical region of Scotland. Culturally, the Highlands and the Lowlands diverged from the Late Middle Ages into the modern period, when Lowland ...
of
Scotland Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to ...
. Major tributaries of the Spean include the left-bank Abhainn Ghuilbinn and
River Treig A river is a natural flowing watercourse, usually freshwater, flowing towards an ocean, sea, lake or another river. In some cases, a river flows into the ground and becomes dry at the end of its course without reaching another body of wate ...
, the right-bank River Roy and the left-bank river known as The Cour. The river is accompanied by the A86 road for almost its entire length, running from (upper) Loch Laggan west to
Spean Bridge Spean Bridge ( gd, Drochaid an Aonachain) is a village in the parish of Kilmonivaig, in Lochaber in the Highland region of Scotland. The village takes its name from the Highbridge over the River Spean on General Wade's military road between ...
. The river is spanned by a bridge carrying the
A82 road The A82 is a major road in Scotland that runs from Glasgow to Inverness via Fort William. It is one of the principal north-south routes in Scotland and is mostly a trunk road managed by Transport Scotland, who view it as an important link ...
near its junction with the A86 at Spean Bridge. A minor road bridges the Spean just above the falls at Inverlair. Two further road crossings exist - a private estate road across the short stretch of river between upper Loch Laggan and the Laggan reservoir and a road traversing the top of Laggan Dam. The
West Highland Line The West Highland Line ( gd, Rathad Iarainn nan Eilean - "Iron Road to the Isles") is a railway line linking the ports of Mallaig and Oban in the Scottish Highlands to Glasgow in Central Scotland. The line was voted the top rail journey in the ...
crosses the river near Tulloch Station and follows its north bank before re-crossing east of Spean Bridge. A branch of the railway formerly continued west beside the river from Spean Bridge, crossing it once again to the west of the village. At the end of the last ice age, Glen Spean and Glen Roy contained lakes dammed by ice with a surface elevation of at one point. The ice dam collapsed catastrophically around 11,500 years ago and five cubic kilometres of floodwater appear to have drained along the line of the Spean gorge occupied by the modern river.


See also

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List of rivers of Scotland This list of rivers in Scotland is organised geographically, taken anti-clockwise, from Berwick-upon-Tweed. Tributaries are listed down the page in an upstream direction. (L) indicates a left-bank tributary and (R) indicates a right-bank tr ...


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Spean Spean Lochaber